Utah School Grabs Lunches from Children in Debt

Students in Utah who rely on a school lunch program to feed themselves were humiliated in front of their classmates when an official ordered their meals taken away and thrown in the garbage because their parents purportedly owed the school money.

Erica Lukes, whose 11-year-old daughter was one of the kids who had her lunch snatched away, called the event “pretty traumatic and humiliating.”

“I think it’s despicable,” she told The Salt Lake Tribune. “These are young children that shouldn’t be punished or humiliated for something the parents obviously need to clear up.” Lukes disputed the notion that her account was in arrears.

“She took my lunch away and said, ‘Go get a milk,’” fifth-grader Sophia Isom, interviewed by KSL.com, said of a school employee. “I…asked, ‘What's going on?’ Then she handed me an orange. She said, ‘You don't have any money in your account so you can't get lunch.’”

A child-nutrition manager was reportedly behind the decision to seize the lunches, in an effort to do something about parents who had not paid the balances for their children’s lunches.

Cafeteria workers gave the children who lost their lunches milk and fruit.

Parents were outraged by the action, as were Democrats and Republicans in the state legislature.

Republican Senator Todd Weiler said the district made a “grievous mistake.”

“To me, this rises to the level of bullying,” he told the Associated Press (AP). “These children were humiliated in their own school, in front of their classmates.” Weiler called for the firing of the cafeteria manager, according to the Tribune.

Indeed, the manager was placed on administrative leave, and more school employees may follow.

Democratic Senator Jim Dabakis said the incident demonstrated that policymakers need to do more to address school funding issues. “We just plain need more money to feed our school children,” he told the AP. “There should not be a hungry child in this state.”

Comments

UCLA Bruin
4 years ago

I think the people behind taking the lunches away should not only be fired, but should be humiliated out in public for their cruel deeds. They should have notified the parents in advance to prevent this act from happening, instead of bullying kids and
"stealing" their lunches. Someone ought to take the managers' and staffs' lunches away from them to see how humiliating it feels......